According to ALa, the Appeal for Courage will be presented to Congress tomorrow at 1430.  If you have not already done so (and you are military - active duty, reservist, or national guard), please head over there and take a look at it.  If you are not at all familiar with it, see below for the wording of the appeal: 

As an American currently serving my nation in uniform, I respectfully urge my political leaders in Congress to fully support our mission in Iraq and halt any calls for retreat. I also respectfully urge my political leaders to actively oppose media efforts which embolden my enemy while demoralizing American support at home. The War in Iraq is a necessary and just effort to bring freedom to the Middle East and protect America from further attack.

If you happen to read this post after 1430 (likely, given my not-so-active reader-base), still head over there and take a poke at it... something tells me that no signature will go uncounted. 

Additionally, the Appeal for Courage webpage provides some interesting information concerning the people who signed the petition (nothing violating anyone's privacy, just demographics)... as well as a rather interesting graph, shown below: 

Please feel free to send that graph to anyone who tries to make the comparison between these two remarkably different conflicts in the future (the one on the Appeal for Courage website is likely to be updated more often than this one is, so you might want to check with them for the most recent). 

Of course, I cannot adequately describe how sad it is that the members of our armed forces are having to petition Congress - predominantly the same Congress that sent them over there in the first place - in order to receive the support they deserve.  To say that many of those Congressmen are acting in a way that seems quite a bit like aiding and supporting the enemy would be putting it mildly, and the damage it is doing to our servicemembers' morale is both distressing and substantial... in addition to the damage being dealt by the media and far too many civilians out in the country.  Whether you agree with the war or not, cotinually calling for retreat and demonizing our soldiers only serves to strengthen the resolve of our enemies, while simultaneously weakening that of our soldiers, sailors, and airmen - and it is high time for that kind of idiocy to stop... especially when it is being perpetrated and perpetuated by the supposed leaders of our nation. 

I can only hope this appeal receives the attention and recognition it deserves, and that Congress stands up and takes notice...  assuming anyone is actually around tomorrow (which is another matter for another post). 

Trackposted to Outside the Beltway, third world county, The Crazy Rants of Samantha Burns, stikNstein... has no mercy, Blue Star Chronicles, Planck's Constant, Stuck On Stupid, The Pink Flamingo, Cao's Blog, Leaning Straight Up, The Amboy Times, Dumb Ox Daily News, Wake Up America, Conservative Cat, and The Yankee Sailor, thanks to Linkfest Haven Deluxe.